Maoists kill one cop, set new deadline

Patna: Maoists Thursday killed Abhay Kumar Yadav, one of the four Bihar policemen they abducted four days ago, following a decision by a 'jan adalat' or kangaroo court.

The Leftwing rebels killed Yadav six hours after their second deadline - at 10 a.m. -expired.

After killing Yadav, a sub-inspector, the Maoists said the fate of the remaining three policemen would be decided by 10 a.m. Friday if the state government failed to initiate a dialogue or negotiate with them.

Avinash, a self-proclaimed Maoist spokesman, told local TV news channels that Yadav was killed after a decision was taken in a 'jan adalat'.

"The Bihar government compelled us to kill Yadav as the second deadline expired," he said.

The other three policemen are Rupesh Kumar Sinha, Lukas Gete and Ehsan Khan.

The Maoists have said the policemen would be killed unless eight jailed Maoist leaders were released.

The families of the policemen have been desperately pleading with Chief Minister Nitish Kumar for help.

Avinash said after the deadline to release their jailed leaders expired at 10 a.m. Thursday, top leaders of the Communist Party of India-Maoist (CPI-Maoist) had been informed about the decision to hold a jan adalat.

The guerrillas had earlier set a deadline of 4 p.m. Wednesday. Avinash later told local Hindi news channels they had decided to extend it till Thursday in view of appeals by the family members of the abducted policemen.

The rebels had abducted the policemen in a six-hour gunfight in Lakhisarai district Sunday. The gunbattle left seven policemen dead and 10 injured. Maoists claimed the gunfight was in retaliation for the killing of their leader Azad and a journalist.

The Maoists have also warned the Bihar government of more violent attacks if the operations against Maoists were not immediately stopped.